As expected MLB officially announced it will end the streaming of live games from within its Facebook page. MLB streamed one game per day throughout spring training. Bob Bowman, CEO of MLB.com said: “What we’re trying to do is figure out who these fans are, whether they like it, and whether they share it.”
Was it success? That depends on what exactly MLB was testing for. Sport Techie will report on details as they emerge in the coming weeks. However, as I wrote last week I believe MLB’s experiment will prove that when given a choice fans will prefer to watch live sports online on a social platform (Facebook) over of a non-social platform (MLB.TV).
Along with its announcement, MLB encouraged fans to sign up for its MLB.TV service. As of now 28 Facebook users have commented on this and not without some complaints. The biggest one being about MLB’s well-documented blackout policy. Facebook user Beau Boedecker commented, “Unfortunately, it’s absolutely worthless because of the blackouts. Fix that and I’m in.”
MLB has done a fantastic job using social media to get fan feedback. Will they make the same effort to listen to it? Time will only tell.